Sacramento State Essay Example for Free

Sacramento State Essay For the college fair, my group received Cal State Sacramento. In my group I was student number one. Student number one was to work on what location, size, and environment. I learned that Sacramento State is approximately 7 hours and 32 minutes away from Perris and is almost 453 miles. While working on my category I found out that Sacramento State is located in the capital of California which is Sacramento. Sacramento State has about 24,136 undergraduate students attending. The total of women that attend are 13,825 and they make up 57% of the campus. The overall number of men that attend is around 10,311 making up 43% of the campus. The ethnic breakdown consists of about 43% American, 20% Asian/Pacific, 16% Latino, 7% African American 2% Foreign, 1% American Indian, and 11% make up others. They have a 300-acre campus and a landscaping of 3,000 tress. There are so many interesting facts that I learned about Sacramento State. There are some really nice near by attractions. For example the waterpark Raging Waters as well as the Sacramento Zoo are two near by attractions. Their mascots name is Herky the Hornet and is 60 years old, and there school colors are Green and gold. Some other interesting facts are that the school was founded in 1947. Some of the majors are criminal justice, social sciences, economics, environmental studies, nursing, as well as engineering. The tuition for the people living in California is about $6,573 and out of state is approximately $17,733. In conclusion Sacramento State might have some bad things about but for the most part it’s a pretty good school.

Settling of America (1620s -1670s) :: history

Settling of America (1620's -1670's) Christopher Columbus discovered the America’s for Spain in 1492. The explorers and settlers that settled in Central and South America were mostly Spanish and Portuguese. The English took notice of the Spanish success in the America’s, so they decided to explore the upper part of the America’s, North America, in the late 1500’s. Virginia was the first settled in the Chesapeake region in about 1607, and then later settlers went north to places like Massachusetts in the New England region in about 1629. Though both areas were settled by the English, they developed two different societies. While Captain John Smith was in Virginia in 1624, the men on the ship waited for the large ship to leave and ‘those of us that had money, spare clothes, credit to give bills of payment, gold rings, fur, or any such commodities, were ever welcome to [purchase supplies. The rest of us patiently obeyed our] vile commanders and [bought] our provisions at fifteen times the value’ (Doc. F). While other men were searching for gold ‘with their golden promises, made all men their slaves in hope of recompense.’ A Puritan lawyer, John Winthrop, immigrated to New England because his views on religion were different from those in England. Even though Puritans are Protestants, Puritans tried to purify the English Church. In 1630 on board of the Arabella on the Atlantic Ocean on way to Massachusetts, he wrote â€Å"A Model of Christian Charity† which gave his views on what a society should be. ‘†¦the condition of mankind, [that] in all times some must be rich, some poor, some high and eminent in power and dignity, other mean and in subjection†¦.[Yet] we must knit together in this work as one man.’ (Doc. A). In this he is saying that men may be different but to make a new world work, they must work together. All through his speech he mentions God. For example, he opens his sermon with ‘God Almighty in his most holy and wise providence†¦Ã¢â‚¬â„¢. This shows that in New England, the people were very religious. New Englanders actually took religion a little too seriously. In the 1680’s and 1690’s Witch trials were taken place, especially in Salem Massachusetts. Women and some men were killed after being suspected of witchcraft until 1692. The religion bracket this happened in was the Puritans were Calvinists with very strict views about society.

Business Ethics Term Paper Essay

So how did all of this pollution develop? One of the ways that Walmart has caused so much pollution is from their increased travel of customers and delivery trucks. Other pollution causes are non-point source water pollution, sprawl and auto pollution, and there is a large amount of energy use going on in the company. And while there are arguments about how Walmart is being reckless with the environment, there is also some good that Walmart is trying to do regarding the environment. While Walmart may not be as efficient as it would like to be when dealing with the environment they are trying to take steps towards it to make sure they are complying with all of the environmental standards. Walmart has a goal to be supplied 100% by renewable energy, to create zero waste, and to try to sell products that sustain people and the environment. These are some possible resolutions to this issue. A website that I found interesting pertaining to this was www. walmartwatch. com. The website states that its mission is to â€Å"hold Walmart fully accountable for its impact on communities, the American workforce, the retail sector, the environment and the nation’s economy. † I think ethically this is a good thing for someone to keep such a large company accountable for what it does. The next ethical issue that I came across was how Walmart exploits its workers and suppliers. Walmart is the world’s largest retail industry but it seems that they fail to use this for the good of its employees. According to Walmart watch the average pay a sales associate gets for being employed at Walmart is $8. 1 an hour. That comes to about $15,500 a year which is based on a full time status there of 34 hours. And most of the employees at Walmart aren’t even full time employees; most of it is part-time jobs which makes their annual salary even less. The problem that people have with this is that Walmart could be paying its employees more than they do n ow and this is where the ethical dilemma comes into play. The problem people may have with this is that in 2010 Walmart’s CEO Mike received 18. 7 million in total compensation. Walmart has also cut two of its longest standing benefits for employees. The first one that got cut was its profit sharing program, and the other one that got cut was that as of 2011, no new employees would any extra an hour for their work on Sundays. Another problem that arises with exploitation is that Walmart has unfair leverage on their suppliers and forces supplier outsourcing. On the other side of this issue is that Walmart does a good job in providing employment. Walmart employs 2. 1 million associates worldwide. This is a good thing that Walmart provides so many jobs especially in a tough economy. Some would argue that it has positive effects on our economy. It seems that everywhere I read that the negatives of employment at Walmart overpower the good. And because of this it is an ethical concern. I think that some of the possible resolutions would be to raise the wage for the employees so that they could be able to afford more. Also they should have kept their employee benefits that they cut. While Walmart may not take care of its employees as well as they should, there is really not argument for their corporate philanthropy. Some of the things they have done is that they donated approximately $800 million in value in 2011 and were name the biggest cash contributor by Chronicle of Philanthropy. Walmart also gave a $2 billion commitment to help end hunger in America. Walmart seems to be doing a very good job in dealing with its philanthropic responsibilities. Another ethical issue that I am going to discuss is the issue of Walmart being a monopoly and how because of this it is destroying other business around it. The reason people think that Walmart is a monopoly is that it owns the majority of the market shares. The reason people think this is because it is the largest in the world in sales by 50% more than its 5 closest competitors combined which includes Target and Sears Holding. Some reasons that it is considered to be a monopoly is that it dwarfs its competition and it affects the products prices and its choices. Walmart has the power to control prices or to get rid of the competition because of it. Walmart’s revenue $404 billion compared to other businesses is so much higher. For example, Macy’s brings in $25 billion in revenues while Sears brings in $46 billion. Because of Walmart’s large size and its buying power, Walmart is able to buy their products at very low prices. Walmart is able to strong arm its suppliers because of its ability to influence it. And while this may be a good thing for Walmart and the people that shop there, how does it affect other businesses in the area? Many people claim that the size of Walmart is hurting white collar businesses. Almost all businesses, big or small are impacted by what Walmart does. Walmart’s competitors are often forced to lower their prices because of Walmart’s ability to keep them so low and because these businesses aren’t as profitable as Walmart, they are often closed because of the lack of profit. The final ethical issue that comes up when talking about Walmart is the affect of Walmart’s low prices. Like stated above a consequence of the low prices are that it can destroy jobs but it also can affect the suppliers profits because of Walmart’s ability to force suppliers to go down on their prices. Because of these low prices thousands of manufacturing jobs have been moved overseas. An article that was written by Emer Basker talks about Walmart and if it is creating jobs or is it destroying jobs and also about the labor market effects on Walmart expansion. And on the other side of this issue the lower prices can be beneficial. Walmart’s slogan is saving money so people can live better. Yes the lower costs help people save money, but at what cost? According to forbes. com, Walmart is actually good for the economy. The lower prices that Walmart can offer to the public ends up benefiting everyone. An exchange of goods at low prices benefits everyone. Even though Walmart low prices seem to benefit everyone it still doesn’t have a very good reputation with the public. In a study done that I found on forbes. com, 24% of Americans think the company is bad for the economy, and 31% had an unfavorable view of it. So what are the stakeholders that are affected by all of these ethical issues? Some of the major stakeholders of Walmart are the owners of Walmart and the CEO, the employees and managers, and suppliers. Some of the secondary stakeholders would be other businesses and customers. Owners would have the most power, legitimacy, and urgency. The CEO and other owners would have the most power to get something done. They would be able to affect the business because they own the majority of the market share. They would also have the highest legitimacy; all of the things they say will be heard and taken care of. They would have the highest urgency in that they would get the businesses immediate attention. I don’t think that if any resolutions of the issues above would have any effect on the power, legitimacy, and urgency of the CEO or the owners. The employees and managers would have a lot less of the power. By doing research on this topic it seems to me that the employees aren’t really treated that well and that they really don’t have that much power. It’s the same for legitimacy and urgency in that they really don’t have much of that either. I don’t think that Walmart really takes into play the employees very much as stakeholders and if the employees ever wanted to get something changed they would have a hard time doing so because of their low power, legitimacy, and urgency. I don’t think that resolving any of the issues above would affect the employees as stakeholders. Some of the secondary stakeholders are other businesses and customers. I think first that the other businesses have absolutely none of the three. Walmart has dwarfed the competition so much that they could do nothing to affect any decision that Walmart would make. I think the customers have at least a little bit of power. They are the ones buying the product so if they voice their displeasure with something then they may be able to get something done. It’s the same with urgency and legitimacy. Some activist groups like the Walmartwatchers. org group might have some power to get something accomplished. They are able to keep Walmart accountable for what they do by keeping track of everything Walmart does. Walmartwatchers. org keeps track of all of the facts on Walmart like their community impact, environmental records, and workplace conditions. I think that because of this they may have some sort of power in making things happen within the business. I think that Walmart uses a utilitarianism approach when it looks at what it’s doing. Utilitarianism says that the best course of action to take is one that provides the greatest good for the greatest number. The attractiveness of utilitarianism is that it makes the decision maker, in this case Walmart, to think about the general welfare. Utilitarianism takes the approach to think in stakeholder terms. They look at owners, employees, customers, and other stakeholders and they see what is best for them and for the company. I think Walmart uses this approach because it is the best way for them to make a profit. By looking at the greatest good for the greatest number they are able to do what they do even though it may not be popular to some people. The only problem with the utilitarianism approach is that it may come into conflict with justice. People think that an increase in total good is not good because it does not take into account any distribution of good. Another ethical approach that I think Walmart uses is the market ethic approach. The market ethic says that selfish action in the marketplace is virtuous because they contribute to efficient operation of the economy. Decision makers might take selfish actions in order for them to make a persona gain in their business dealings. I think that Walmart could use this ethical approach because I think they are selfish in their thinking in that if it causes personal gain then it doesn’t matter if it is selfish or not. As far as the ethical tests go, I think an important ethical test that could be considered would be the test of making something public. This test asks if you would still make the decision even if you know that everyone would be able to see it. This test addresses the issue of whether or not your decision could take scrutiny from the public. I think Walmart should use this ethical test as a way to help them make decisions. They could use this test in almost all of the issues that were mentioned above. If they would make public about how they were dealing with the environment or how they were dealing with their employees then I think it would help them make better decisions. So how can you look at this with a spiritual perspective? I think as Christians we need to look at what Walmart is doing and look at it through our Christina worldview. I think that some of the things that Walmart does like not taking care of the environment as well as they should and not treating their employees as well as they should go against what is found in the Bible. The Bible says to be good stewards of earth and it also talks a lot about treating people fairly. So how should a Christian seek to resolve these issues? I think that trying to resolve it by yourself would be very difficult if not impossible to get anything done. I think that by forming an activist group with other believers you could get you point out better than if you were trying to do it alone. Ultimately after doing research on Walmart, I think that Walmart has a lot to fix. But I also think that Walmart is beneficial to the economy and it doing a good job with supplying its low prices to people. It just needs to be careful that it does not become a monopoly and destroy jobs and other businesses around it. In my opinion I think Walmart is a good company that is doing a lot to help the economy.

An Achievement Gap Created by the Summer Slide Before Grade 9

By the time students in the United States enter grade 12, they will have spent 96 weeks, or the rough equivalent of 2 out 13 required academic years, in time designated as summer vacation. Researchers have been bemoaning the loss of this collective time as they point to the negative consequences of summer vacation up to and including high school..   Negative Impact of Summer Vacation Research A meta-analysis of 138 influences or â€Å"what works in education† was published (2009)  in  Influences And Effect Sizes Related To Student Achievement  by John Hattie and Greg Yates. Their results are posted on their  Visible Learning  website.   They ranked the effects of completed studies (national and international), and using the data combined from these studies, they developed a rating where any influence greater than .04 was a contribution to student achievement. For their finding on summer vacation,  Ã‚  39 studies  were used  to rank the effect of summer vacation on student achievement. The findings using this data revealed summer vacation as having  a negative effect (  -.09 effect) on education. In other words, summer vacation ranked at the bottom of what works in education, a dismal 134 out of 138 influences.. Many researchers refer to the achievement damage done during these months off as summer learning loss or the â€Å"summer slide†Ã‚  as described on the US Department of Educations blog Homeroom. A similar finding came from  Ã‚  Ã¢â‚¬Å"The Effects of Summer Vacation on Achievement Test Scores: A Narrative and Meta-Analytic Review†Ã‚  by  H. Cooper, et al. Their work updated the findings of a 1990 study that originally found: Summer learning loss is very real and has important repercussions in the lives of students, especially those with fewer financial resources. There were several key findings outlined in their updated 2004 report: At best, students showed little or no academic growth over the summer. At worst, students lost one to three months of learning.Summer learning loss was somewhat greater in math than reading.Summer learning loss was greatest in math computation and spelling.For disadvantaged students, reading scores were disproportionately affected and the achievement gap between rich and poor widened. This achievement gap between haves and have nots widens with summer learning loss. Socio-Economic Status and Summer Learning Loss Multiple studies have confirmed that  students in low-income households develop an average two month reading gap during the summer. This gap is cumulative, and each summers two month gap contributes to a sizable learning loss, especially in reading, by the time a student reaches grade 9. Research published in the article Lasting Consequences of the Summer Learning Gap   by  Karl L. Alexander, et al, charted how a students socio-economic status (SES) plays a role is summer learning loss: We find that cumulative achievement gains over the first nine years of childrens schooling mainly reflect school-year learning, whereas the high SES-low SES achievement gap at 9th grade mainly traces to differential summer learning over the elementary years. In addition, a  white paper commissioned by the Summer Reading Collective determined that  two-thirds of the 9th grade achievement gap in reading could be between students from low-income households and their higher-income peers. Other important findings findings pointed out that access to books was critical to slowing summer learning loss. Neighborhoods in low income areas with public libraries for student access to reading materials had  significantly more gains in reading scores from spring to fall than students from high-income households with access to books as well as those from low-income households without access to books at all. Finally, the Summer Reading Collective noted that socio-economic factors played a critical role in learning experiences (access to reading materials, travel, learning activities) stating: Differences in children’s summer learning experiences during their elementary school years can ultimately impact whether they earn a high school diploma and continue to college. With the considerable amount of research documenting the negative impact of summers off, one may wonder why the American public education system embraced summer vacation. History of Summer Vacation: The Agrarian Myth Dispelled Despite the widely held myth that the educational calendar followed farm calendars, the 178 day school year (national average) became standardized for an entirely different reason.  The adoption of summer vacation was the result of an industrial society that opted to let urban students out of the sweltering cities  during the summer months. Kenneth Gold, a professor of education at the College of Staten Island, debunked the myth of an agrarian school year in his 2002 book  School’s In: The History of Summer Education in American Public Schools.  Ã‚   In the opening chapter,Gold notes that if schools were following a true agrarian school year, students would be more available during the summer months while crops  were growing but unavailable during planting (late spring) and harvesting (early fall).   His research demonstrated  that before the standardized school year,  there were concerns that too much school was bad for the health of students and teachers: â€Å"There was a whole medical theory that [people would get sick] from too much schooling and teaching† (25). Summer vacation was the solution to these medical concerns during the  mid-19th Century.   As  cities expanded rapidly, concerns were raised about the moral and physical dangers that unsupervised summer posed to urban youth. Gold goes into great detail about the  Vacation Schools, urban opportunities that offered a wholesome alternative. The 1/2 day  sessions in these vacation schools were attractive to participants and teachers were allowed to be  creative and more lax, addressing the  fears of [mental] overtaxation (125). By the end of World War I,   these vacation schools had become more in line with a growing academic bureaucracy. Gold notes, ...summer schools adopted a regular academic focus and a credit-bearing function, and they soon bore little resemblance to the vacation programs that preceded them (142). These academic summer schools were geared to allow students to gain extra credits, either to catch up or to accelerate, however, the creativity and innovations of these vacation schools diminished as the funding and staffing were in the hands of the administrative progressives that were overseeing the urban districts   Gold traces the standardization of education noting the growing body of  research on the adverse impact of summer vacation, especially on economically disadvantaged students as a growing concern. His work on how American education served the needs of a  continuously growing â€Å"summer leisure economy† clearly demonstrates  the stark contrast of mid-19th Century’s academic standards with the growing demands of 21st Century academic standards with their emphasis on college and career readiness. Stepping Away from Traditional Summer Vacation Schools K-12, and post-secondary experiences, from community college to graduate universities, are now experimenting  with a burgeoning market of opportunities for online learning. The opportunities bear names such as   Synchronous Distributed Course,  Web-Enhanced Course,  Blended Program, and others; they are all  forms of e-learning.   E-learning is rapidly changing the design of the traditional school year as it can be made available beyond the walls of a classroom at varying times. These new opportunities may make learning available through multiple platforms throughout the year. In addition, experiments with year-round learning are already well into their third decade. Over 2 million students participated (by 2007), and the research (Worthen 1994,   Cooper 2003)  on the effects of year round schools explained in   What Research Says About Year-Round Schooling (compiled by  Tracy A. Huebner) shows a positive impact: Students in year-round schools do as well or slightly better in terms of academic achievement than students in traditional schools;Year-round education may be particularly beneficial for students from low-income families;Students, parents, and teachers who participate in a year-round school tend to have positive attitudes about the experience. On more than one follow-up to these studies, the explanation for the positive impact is simple: The loss of retention of information that occurs during the three-month summer vacation is lessened by the shorter, more frequent vacations that characterize year-round calendars. Unfortunately, for those students without intellectual stimulation, enrichment, or reinforcement-whether they are economically disadvantaged or not- the long span of summer will culminate in an achievement gap.    Conclusion The  artist Michelangelo is reputed to have said, I am still learning (Ancora Imparo)  at the age of 87, and while he never enjoyed the American public school summer vacation, it is unlikely he went for long periods without the intellectual stimulation that made him the man of the Renaissance. Perhaps his quote could inverted as a question if there are chances to change the design of school academic calendars. Educators could ask, Are they still learning during the summer?